Houlihan Lokey Inc (HLI) 2022 Q3 法說會逐字稿

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for standing by. Welcome to Houlihan Lokey's Third Quarter Fiscal Year 2022 Earnings Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) Please note that this conference is being recorded today, February 8, 2022.

I will now turn the call over to Christopher Crain, Houlihan Lokey's General Counsel.

Thank you, operator, and hello, everyone. By now, everyone should have access to our third quarter fiscal year 2022 earnings release, which can be found on the Houlihan Lokey website at www.hl.com in the Investor Relations section.

Before we begin our formal remarks, we need to remind everyone that the discussion today will include forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements, which are usually identified by use of words such as will, expect, anticipate, should or other similar phrases are not guarantees of future performance. These statements are subject to numerous risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from what we expect. And therefore, you should exercise caution when interpreting and relying on them. We refer all of you to our recent SEC filings for a more detailed discussion of the risks that could impact our future operating results and financial condition. We encourage investors to review our regulatory filings, including the Form 10-Q for the quarter ended December 31, 2021, when it is filed with the SEC.

During today's call, we will discuss non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe can be useful in evaluating the company's financial performance. These measures should not be considered in isolation or as a substitute for our financial results prepared in accordance with GAAP. A reconciliation of these measures to the most directly comparable GAAP measures is available in our earnings release and our investor presentation on the hl.com website.

Hosting the call today, we have Scott Beiser, Houlihan Lokey's Chief Executive Officer; and Lindsey Alley, Chief Financial Officer of the company. They will provide some opening remarks, and then we will open the call to questions.

With that, I'll turn the call over to Scott.

Thank you, Christopher. Welcome, everyone, to our third quarter fiscal year 2022 earnings call. We are pleased to report another very strong quarter. We achieved $889 million in third quarter revenues, up 65% from the same quarter a year ago. All 3 of our business segments performed exceptionally well in their respective environments. Corporate Finance and Financial and Valuation Advisory delivered record quarterly results in a robust market environment and Financial Restructuring delivered solid results in a challenging restructuring environment.

We also experienced strong earnings growth, delivering $2.90 in adjusted earnings per share, up 63% from the same quarter a year ago. More important than a single quarter of results is our leadership position in each of our business lines, that is where we look to assess the long-term quality and durability of our earnings.

Houlihan Lokey maintained its status as a leader across all 3 product lines for calendar year 2021. We ranked as the #1 global M&A investment banking firm based on the number of transactions closed, and we are proud to announce that we were the #2 M&A investment banking firm in Europe based on the number of transactions closed. We are also the #1 global restructuring adviser based on both the number of transactions closed and the dollar value of restructured debt. And finally, we remain the #1 global M&A fairness opinion provider over the past 20 years, based on the number of transactions announced or closed.

Moving back to the quarter. A record third fiscal quarter results were driven by a combination of several positive events some of which are not likely to fully repeat over the next several quarters. First, Corporate Finance revenues for the quarter included the results of GCA, which makes last year's third quarter revenues not directly comparable and GCA's contribution to the quarter exceeded expectations.

Second, in Corporate Finance, we had a significant number of higher fee transactions closed in our third fiscal quarter relative to previous quarters and a significantly higher number than what is expected to close in the next couple of quarters. Third, for our Corporate Finance business, not including GCA, the third quarter has historically, on average, represented a seasonal high relative to our other 3 quarters. In addition, the fourth calendar quarter for GCA has historically represented a seasonal high for them as well. Both Houlihan Lokey and GCA performed extremely well for our third fiscal quarter, highlighting the seasonality of both businesses.

Finally, our Corporate Finance and our FVA business are benefiting from the most robust M&A market we have ever seen with strength across industry and geography. It is well publicized that financial sponsors have been a strong influence on these markets and financial sponsor clients remain close to 50% of our client base.

As we head into calendar year 2022, we are still experiencing a very strong M&A and capital markets environment for our mid-cap clients. There remains historically high levels of private equity dry powder large strategic clients remain flushed with cash and interest rates remain low. However, we expect growth in the M&A market to level off in calendar 2022, and we have seen a slowing rate of growth in our new engagement activity levels over the last several months when compared to the same period last year.

Moving on to some comments more specific to FVA. This business has performed at record levels for us throughout our fiscal year, and our fiscal third quarter was no exception. For each of the last 6 consecutive quarters, FVA has achieved an increase over the prior year's quarter, and year-to-date, FVA is up 64% over the same period last year.

Given the diversification of revenues in this business, these results are extraordinary. Growth is broad-based across all of the FVA's major product lines with several of them benefiting from strong M&A market conditions. FVA continues to see higher average revenues per fee event, higher average productivity per banker and increasing number of 7-figure engagement fees. In fact, in the third fiscal quarter, FVA recognized 1 of the largest fees in its history.

Financial Restructuring had another solid quarter despite ongoing limited opportunities in the marketplace. This business is currently experiencing new activity levels at or below pre-pandemic periods. Headwinds for this product line include a weak restructuring environment, which is impacting our near-term revenue prospects and the completion of a couple of large fee events this year that may not repeat in fiscal year 2023. Positives for this business include our belief that we are winning and closing more than our fair market share of restructuring mandates in the current environment, and our continued success in Asia, particularly China, as we take advantage of our leading market position in this very attractive market. We are also starting to see an uptick in interest rates globally, which tends to drive restructuring activity.

Before concluding, I wanted to highlight several factors that look beyond our third quarter results, and we believe set the stage for our midterm and long-term success. First, our brand and reputation are significantly greater and more recognizable than just a few years ago. This has and will enable us to attract better talent at all levels as well as being an attractive acquirer of businesses. We've never seen a more attractive pipeline of talents than we are seeing today.

Second, starting in fiscal year 2023, we will have a full year of GCA results versus only 6 months of results in fiscal 2022. We are quite pleased with the GCA acquisition to date and integration efforts are on track. Nevertheless, we expect it will take several years to fully realize potential revenue synergies between our businesses.

Third, FVA is experiencing a new growth profile beyond just current market conditions, and we remain excited about the long-term growth prospects of this business, the growth in our continued investment in this product line has created enough scale for FVA to achieve ongoing growth and success as it enters new markets.

And fourth, while Financial Restructuring is currently experiencing a very lean market for its services, our strong leadership position, the absolute size of corporate leverage globally, the inevitable rise in interest rates, the expectation of less active Central Bank intervention and ongoing technology and global trade disruption establish a clear path to long-term revenue growth.

We ended the calendar year with over 2,200 employees and 12-month pro forma revenues in excess of $2.5 billion. In addition to adding over 75 new MDs to our senior banking group through the GCA acquisition, we hired 5 managing directors this quarter, 3 in Corporate Finance and 2 in Financial Restructuring. We are very proud of how well all of our employees have done over the last several years, and we welcome all of our new partners to confirm. Collectively, we look forward to continued success in the years ahead.

And with that, I'll turn the call over to Lindsey.

Thank you, Scott. Revenues in Corporate Finance were $716 million for the quarter, up 134% when compared to the same quarter last year. We almost doubled the number of closed transactions this quarter, reaching 230 transactions closed compared to 121 in the same period last year. Corporate Finance benefited from some very favorable timing of closed transactions, a continuing trend towards higher close rates and as Scott suggested, a disproportionately higher number of large fee transactions. These large fee transactions drove our average transaction fee higher than what we would have reported for the quarter in a more normalized operating environment.

We expect that our average transaction fee next quarter will decline to a number that represents a more normalized mix of Houlihan Lokey and GCA's average transaction fee. From there, we expect it to resume a growth rate consistent with what we have experienced over the past 2 decades.

Financial Restructuring revenues were $89 million for the quarter, a 50% decrease from the same quarter last year. However, last year's third quarter benefited significantly from pandemic closures and the disruption of business earlier in the year. We closed 21 transactions this quarter compared to 44 in the same period last year, and our average transaction fee on closed deals was relatively flat.

Financial Restructuring has benefited thus far in fiscal year 2022 with the closing of several larger fee transactions, while new business activity is generally made up of smaller fee opportunities.

In Financial and Valuation Advisory, revenues were $84 million for the quarter, a 56% increase from the same period last year. We had 901 fee events during the quarter compared to 639 in the same period last year. FVA is benefiting from strong M&A markets and continued productivity gains across all major product lines.

Turning to expenses. Our adjusted compensation expenses were $547 million for the third fiscal quarter versus $335 million for the same period last year. Our only adjustment was for deferred retention payments related to certain acquisitions. Our adjusted compensation expense ratio was 61.5% for both the quarter and year-to-date.

Beginning in our fourth fiscal quarter and continuing for 4 years, any accruals associated with the previously mentioned retention pool of $133 million related to the GCA acquisition will be included in this adjustment.

Our adjusted noncompensation expenses were $59 million for the quarter versus $39 million for the same quarter last year, an increase of 52%. This considerable increase is primarily associated with the addition of GCA's noncompensation expenses, increases in TM&E and general inflationary trends in several expense items. We expect to continue to see accelerated increases in TM&E and marketing costs as a result of the easing of COVID restrictions.

Our adjusted noncompensation expense ratio was 6.6% for the quarter versus 7.2% in the same period last year. For the fourth quarter, we adjusted out of our noncompensation expenses, $15 million in noncash acquisition-related amortization, the vast majority of which was amortized related to the GCA acquisition. We expect significantly elevated levels of amortization relating to this acquisition through fiscal year 2023.

In addition, we adjusted out of our noncompensation expenses, $16 million in acquisition and integration costs related to the GCA acquisition. We expect to continue to see some integration-related costs in subsequent quarters but we believe the bulk of those costs were in our third fiscal quarter.

Our adjusted other income and expense decreased for the quarter to an expense of approximately $0.3 million versus income of approximately $0.2 million in the same period last year. This was primarily due to a $900,000 reduction in the carrying value of our SPAC due to the requirement to mark-to-market investment each reporting period.

Our effective tax rate for the quarter was 30% compared to 25.3% during the same quarter last year. Taxes are up as a result of increased state taxes, increased nondeductible expenses as we recover from the pandemic and return to work, the addition of nondeductible GCA transaction costs and increased foreign taxes.

Turning to the balance sheet and uses of cash. As of the quarter end, we had approximately $1.1 billion of unrestricted cash and equivalents and investment securities. As a reminder, a significant portion of this cash is earmarked to cover accrued but unpaid bonuses. Houlihan Lokey will pay cash bonuses in February and March for calendar year 2021 to GCA employees who joined us in the merger. We will pay additional cash bonuses in May, consistent with our historical schedule for our fiscal year 2022. Beginning next fiscal year, all employees will be on the same schedule.

Finally, in this past quarter, we have repurchased approximately 645,000 shares at an average price of $108.90 per share as part of our share repurchase program. Midway through our fourth quarter, we expect to issue approximately $215 million of HL stock to GCA employees $133 million of that amount is for the retention pool previously mentioned, and the balance is the stock portion of GCA's calendar 2021 performance bonus.

And finally, we are pleased to announce we were paying a dividend of $0.43 per share payable on March 15 to shareholders of record as of March 2.

And with that, operator, we can open the line for questions.

(Operator Instructions) Our first question is from Ken Worthington with JPMorgan.

On FVA, you cited in the press release that the number of deals increased across all parts of FVA. Can you give us a little bit more detail on those bigger contributors and how they performed?

And then I think more interesting to me is the jump in the fee per event in FVA. That fee growth has been sort of more stable over the last 6 or so quarters, but jumped a good bit in the December quarter. Now you mentioned a particularly large fee event. So could you give us a little bit more flavor there, but really on the broader jump in the fee per event in FVA?

I think this has been a continuation of really work that we focused on over the last couple years. The business functions really under a variety of subproduct areas. Some of it's focused on doing portfolio evaluation work, some of it's focused on doing transactional work, some is focused on what we call transactional advisory services or corporate valuation type of work. So there's a variety of services and effectively an ongoing orientation, I would say, away from just a focus on a project to more a focus on doing work in multiple tasks for clients.

So over the years and quarters, we've built, I think, an increased relationship with key clients. We've continued to do more repeat work. And that work has generated not only more fee events as we've described, but also the size, complexity of that work has continued to increase, I think, the reputation of the firm has and just the market exists out there.

Regarding your question on a large fee event, this is a business, by its very nature, we do a lot of work at smaller-sized fees, but more and more, we have seen us doing work for $1 million or a couple million dollars for clients, which was much more unusual a couple years ago, not quite as unusual today.

Our next question is from Manan Gosalia with Morgan Stanley.

Scott, in a recent interview, you spoke about the opportunity for independent advisers to offer help with private debt capital raising, and how -- we're still in early days for that business. Can you give a little bit more color on that? How are you seeing -- how large do you see this business growing? What the fee rates are in that business and what the opportunity set is for your firm specifically?

And also, is that something you need a specialized team for? Or does that more involve existing senior bankers building deeper relationships with sponsors and their associated companies?

It's a business that we really like. We think it is rapidly growing. It still has a lot of growth to go. I think we probably would have said not too long ago, that the size of the -- of our capital markets business, we think, could rival the size of our M&A business. Considering how well we've done in M&A in the last couple of quarters here, it might be a little difficult to get to that 50-50 level.

But what we're finding is there's just a tremendous amount of interest by companies and private equity firms to source from advisers like ourselves to help them find the right kind of capital. And as we've mentioned for many times that the number of providers of that capital have continued to grow and where you find that capital and the exact terms and conditions of that capital has become more and more important.

We believe we've got 1 of the largest, if not largest, staff dedicated in the mid-cap market for providing this kind of service. We continue to hire in that area. We continue to grow geographically along industry lines, along particular specialties within the capital structure and think that over the years ahead, this will continue to be a major growth component of the firm and a major component in totality of not only the firm and Corporate Finance, but it helps in other parts of our product lines as well.

Got it. And would the rate environment matter for that business? Like would high rates be more beneficial?

It has some elements to it. We always want the availability of capital at times making it a little more difficult for the CFO of the client or a member of a private equity firm to be able to access the capital themselves deters away from what we could do.

So a little bit of difficulty, a little bit of issues out in the marketplace actually helped the business. Just don't wanted to get where interest rates get too high where the availability of capital drives up too much. At this point, I think where the market is, maybe even where it's heading in the next couple quarters, it looks like actually a very good opportunity set for a firm like ours.

Great. That's helpful. And then can you talk a little bit about just the recent market volatility and how that's been factoring into your conversations with clients? I know that GCA gives you more exposure in the tech space where we've seen most of the band recently.

But just given the cohort of companies you advised and your sponsor relationships, these lower valuations might actually spur deal activity even more. So I just wanted to know what are you hearing from clients on both the buy and sell side given what we've seen recently in the market.

Clearly, for all of us who are in the financial marketplace, we've seen and experienced more volatility but a couple of things I'd say. At this point, it may only be 1 month or 1.5 months long in this volatility, probably need a longer duration before it really impacts in some cases positive, in some cases negative where our business might go.

We've also found that the volatility tends to impact public transactions more than private transactions. And due to our mid-cap focus especially in Corporate Finance, we tend to deal more with private companies or companies owned by financial sponsors. So we're sensitive to what's happened in the marketplace. It impacts somewhat differently to all of our industry groups but at this juncture, don't really see the increased volatility.

I wouldn't be out there telling you it's significantly hoping to do more deals or conversely significantly slowing down or repricing deals. That might change in the quarters ahead. But sitting here in the early parts of February, I think it's much more of a public traded stock issue than in many cases than what's occurring in the private marketplace.

Our next question is from Devin Ryan with JMP Securities.

First question, I just want to maybe touch on the European sponsor market. And I guess, specifically, kind of what you guys are seeing there today? And then also, if you just can given your strength there, just the maturation of that market. I know there's been significant pools of capital raised there, and you guys have made a concerted effort to be bigger in Europe, and that's been successful.

But can you just maybe talk a little bit more bigger picture around how the firm has been performing with sponsors in Europe, but also kind of where you see that market today versus maybe where it could be in 3 or 4 years just based on the pools of capital raised?

I think the European sponsor market started a decade plus ago primarily with U.S. firms that opened up European operations. It now has clearly all the major and mid-major firms with a presence in Europe. And then you have dozens or hundreds of also peer European-based sponsor firms. So the number of firms have continued to grow, cooling up the size and what you see in the states at this juncture.

And then what we have found is, as we've added a significant amount of heft in terms of our coverage capabilities, of our industry expertise, our geographical substance in Europe, we're seeing a lot more deal flow. We're talking a lot more prospects. We're having a lot more interaction.

We seem to kind of go through periods where the European marketplace appears to be moving from a growth standpoint, a little ahead of the States and then sometimes it comes back down. In the U.S., looks a little more favorable. But we feel very confident that Europe will continue for our business to be a significant contributor.

And we went from, I think, an also-ran player to a true dominant player in Europe and specifically with the sponsor community. And we've continued to actually add some dedicated resources that are doing nothing but calling on those sponsors out of Europe.

Okay. I appreciate the color. And then a quick follow-up here just on the restructuring business. Appreciate kind of the outlook commentary and kind of some of the normalization or even move below kind of pre-pandemic levels of activity.

We have heard from some of your peers that they're starting to see signs of more activity or those kind of early conversations? Are you guys seeing that as well, obviously, higher rates or other geopolitical issues or other factors could drive more activity.

But are there any early indicators that restructuring may be starting to improve from kind of the currently quieter levels? Or is it just more if those factors play out than it could? Just trying to think about what's actually happening on the ground today.

So I'd say 2 things. If you look at the macro facts that are out there that can help the restructuring business, I think it's clearly more positive than negative. There's just a lot of potential, as we mentioned, total amount of indebtedness, interest rates appears like they can only go more up than down, less government intervention, all the ongoing technology disruptors, et cetera, all of that lays a positive framework. What we don't know and none of us control is when will all that tend to impact the number of companies in default.

So the second point that I'd say is it's been going on for maybe 1 year plus, it's -- you can have a month where you tend to get far more positive feelers and then it tends to cool down. So we just haven't seen a string of enough months together that says, "Oh, yes, the tide has definitely turned. We're definitely starting to see an increase that feels like it's going to last for a year or 2 in restructuring." So it really almost depends what month you talked about what day of the week you talked about. So that would be our commentary.

We see clearly certain grassroots are increasing in certain areas. They haven't really started to sprout yet. We just haven't seen a consistent set of months that would get us to the point that says, yes, we think we definitely have hit bottom and up from here yet.

Our next question is from Michael Brown with KBW.

I wanted to, I guess, follow up on Europe and the Corporate Finance business. How much of the fiscal third quarter revenue came from Europe? And any specific comments in regards to your outlook for the region there, just given the rising geopolitical uncertainty there?

So in our disclosure, not necessarily in the release, but when we come out with the Q and annual report, we do talk about where our total revenues are from all of our business lines. Otherwise, we don't specifically discuss exactly what it is by product.

I would tell you the statistical importance of our non-U.S. business has clearly grown since, a, we've added people ourselves, and clearly the acquisition of GCA, which significantly increased our presence in Europe and in the Asia Pacific region. So that continues.

I think, due to the size of our staff and where it's located, we'll continue to increase. And we are feeling that there is quite a bit of more activity going on in Europe than we would have seen a couple of years ago. And I think part of that is the market itself, and part of it is just because we have more bankers now in that geography, we're more attuned to what's going on in the marketplace than where we would have been 3, 5 years ago.

Okay. So no real near-term pressure at this point in Europe?

No. Like I said, I think business consolidation and M&A activity, they're slowly falling along and some of the SPAC deals, clearly be our importance out there and sponsor activity continues to increase. We're seeing improvements, I think, really across the board and opportunities for us in Europe.

Okay. Great. And just as a follow-up, on Corporate Finance, you talked about the seasonal strength in the quarter and also some other key drivers for this quarter. But I wanted to clarify, is there any -- was there kind of a larger proportion of your nontraditional M&A-related fees this quarter? Was that somewhat elevated as well?

And I don't think the pull forward is typically something that impacts Houlihan Lokey, but I just wanted to check to see if there was any pull forward into the fiscal third quarter above normal levels.

Lindsey, do you want to comment anything on that?

Yes, sure. I think from a nontraditional M&A fees, the answer is no. I think our mix of mergers and acquisitions and our capital markets business was not any different this quarter than in previous quarters. We do -- we have pull forward the way you describe it every quarter we've had for years. It's just the way we accrue revenues. So there are no unusual circumstances around pull forward this quarter.

I think the unusual circumstances were kind of what Scott had mentioned earlier, which was we did have a disproportionately high number of larger fee transactions for this quarter relative to the last several quarters and relative to what we're expecting in the next couple of quarters. So I think that's 1 of the things that drove significant revenues in Corporate Finance.

We had high close rates this quarter, which is a continuing trend and maybe some time -- some favorable timing around some transactions as well. But not the mix of business and not pull forward at all that had any impact on the quarter.

Our next question is from Steven Chubak with Wolfe Research.

Wanted to really spend some time just unpacking some of the comments you made around the Corporate Finance fee rate. You noted the high fee rate per transaction helped buoy results this quarter. It was up 19% year-on-year and you acknowledge that it should begin to normalize.

Since we don't have as much experience with GCA, I was hoping you could just help frame how we should think about the normalized fee rate within Corporate Finance versus that $3 million level that we saw in the most recent quarter?

Go ahead, Lindsey.

Yes. We can't give you a specific numbers around what we expect the fee rate to be. It's just not something that we'll disclose. But what we can tell you is that if you separate the 2 businesses, which we don't like to do, but we'll do it for discussion purposes, the Houlihan Lokey excluding GCA business, on average had extremely high average fee rates this quarter.

For most of the acquisitions that we've historically done those acquisitions have average fee rates, they tend to be a little lower than what Houlihan Lokey's is. GCA is no different. So GCA's average fee rates were a bit lower than Houlihan Lokey's for the quarter. When you blend the 2 of them, they tended to be right around that $3 million number that you're seeing in the earnings release.

Expectations are that the Houlihan Lokey business over the next couple of quarters, that average fee rate will come down and GCA's will stay the same or go up, which will bring the $3 million down to some number likely in the 2s. And so that's the dynamic that Scott and I were talking about is that we had an artificially high average fee rate this quarter driven by Houlihan Lokey. Expectations are that on a blended basis, that will come down to something in the 2s, and then from there, it will start to grow at the average rates that it's been growing over the last couple of decades.

And Scott and I have talked about the fact that, on average, our average transaction size, our average fee rates tend to go up, but in baby steps. This quarter, it was not a baby step. It was a much larger step than we expected to kind of come back down to a normalized level.

And just I had a follow-up on some of the comments you made on the noncomp side. I was hoping you can give some color on how we should be thinking about the noncomp dollar run rate ex the acquisition cost, recognizing there was a fair amount of noise just so we can try to think about the appropriate jumping off point and how should we be thinking about T&E normalization now that travel is starting to come back?

So the first part of it, I'd say the quarterly -- this quarter's noncompensation expense on an adjusted basis, is probably a pretty good absolute dollar number to use. I will caution you though, we do have a little seasonality in the non-comp number. Remember, a portion of the noncomp number is reimbursable expenses from clients.

So as revenues increase, the reimbursable expenses increase, noncomp increases, so you're going to have some volatility in noncomp based on how the revenues perform for the quarter. There's also some seasonality in noncomp around things like recruiting and training, but this quarter number is actually a pretty good quarter number from an absolute basis for our third quarter.

And then with respect to TM&E, look, I think it's -- as you can see, significantly higher than it was this time last year, expectations are that you will see outsized growth in that number as we return to work. Where it settles? I think we're all still trying to estimate that. I've heard peers say anywhere from 60% to 80% of what it used to be.

I think that's probably a pretty good number. We don't think it will go to the same rates per MD or rates per average employee in terms of TM&E spend. I think people become more efficient in the way they think about travel. Having said that, we haven't seen the top yet in terms of upside to that number.

So it's anyone's guess on when it occurs, whether it's next quarter or the quarter after, it will likely happen sometime in this calendar year unless we find ourselves with a new variant and a new set of restrictions. But expectations for us is that sometime in this calendar year, we'll be back to what we think is a more normalized TM&E number. And we'll let you know when we get there, we just don't know when it's going to be.

I completely understand, Lindsey. Admittedly, at the same time, your MD count is also up 40%. So certainly, that's going to drive some level of pressure there as well.

It will, yes.

Okay. And just if I could squeeze in 1 more. Just a topic that's coming up quite often as it relates to you guys specifically, which is around the earnings growth algorithm. And -- if there's 1 thing you guys have demonstrated consistently over time, it's the durability of your revenues.

And if I look at Slide 26, it shows the historical contribution from corp fin. Historically, you've been remarkably consistent in that 50% to 56% range, naturally pro forma GCA, that contribution over the last 9 months is north of [$70 million] certainly, the subdued restructuring environment hasn't helped.

But I was hoping you could just speak to your confidence in sustaining that more durable, less volatile revenue stream despite the change in mix? And whether you believe the legacy earnings growth algorithm that you guys have spoken to in the past, whether that's ultimately still -- where that paradigm still holds?

I would focus on what I think we've built is more diversification than we've ever had. And you have to look at it beyond just the cyclicality balance that historically, people have focused on between maybe Corporate Finance and Restructuring. So what do I mean by that? We have more core industry groups that we follow and we're much more balanced than we were before.

We're much more balanced, I think, in our geographical outreach that we have. We're probably even a little more balanced in the amount of financial sponsored clientele we have versus corporate clientele we have. We've got a growing FDA business that tends to run generally less, at least historically less volatile than the transactional business of M&A or financial restructuring.

We continue to have really hundreds of key employees and not focused on a very small subset of employees shareholders, clients, et cetera. So it's always been, I think, in our DNA to try to find how we can continue to grow but do it on a diversified basis that hopefully we'll minimize the volatility. We can't obviously predict what will happen in the marketplace. There are certain things we don't control from interest rates to the stock markets, geopolitical issues, but I think we have continued to build a very diversified and hopefully sustainable and growing business.

And I think also since we tend to do deal more in the mid-cap space clearly in Corporate Finance. The size transaction aren't nearly as important on restructuring or FVA, but that also provides some element of less volatility than the bigger cap space.

Our next question is from Richard Ramsden with Goldman Sachs.

So just a quick question for me. Can you just comment on what you're seeing in terms of cross-border activity? Has that started to pick up materially? And perhaps I know it's early, but maybe you could just comment on whether you think you see a materially increases the opportunity set for you in terms of cross-border transactions.

So yes and yes. I think, a, the market has continued to be healthy. As the size of our deals, as Lindsey mentioned, they grow, but they tend to grow in kind of baby steps. And the fact that we've always been a dominant player for many years, decade plus in the U.S.

And I think we're now also one of the most dominant players in Europe and a growing dominant player in Asia all of that allows us to do much more cross-border work. And we know while we've only been together with GCA for a short number of months, we're pitching business that we would have never been able to pitch. We are winning business that we would never be able to win. It's still early days in actually executing on some of those newly hired tasks, but as we move forward in 1 firm, we think collectively, there will be more work for us out there. And clearly, a lot of it is cross-border work just due to, I think, the increased presence we have across the globe.

Our next question is from Jeff Harte with Piper Sandler.

So a couple left for me. One, on the sustainability of Corporate Finance activity levels, you guys mentioned slowing revenue growth likely and slowing new engagements year-over-year. Want to make sure I'm interpreting that correctly. Still growing, just growing at a slower pace. Is that what you're saying as opposed to actually declining on the new engagement side?

Yes. That is what we mean.

Okay. That's what I was hoping, but good to hear.

Yes.

And then secondly, I was kind of surprised by the level of cash and investable securities on the balance sheet, given that you paid for GCA and a round of deferred cash bonuses this quarter. How should we think about that cash balance now for you as a larger company? And I'm just kind of maybe trying to see what that means as far as potential buybacks or maybe your willingness to enter into other transactions.

Yes. So we did have an unusually strong cash quarter. We [met] our pretax margins, and therefore, our net income margins remain high as a result of favorable noncompensation expenses, I kind of alluded to that in an earlier question, particularly around TM&E. And as a result, we're just generating quite a bit of cash.

GCA's additional revenues at similar margins to ours is also generating along with Houlihan some significant cash, and we both had a very strong quarter. And then in addition, we had some favorable working capital trends this quarter that were, I think, more timing than anything else. And so that added to our cash position.

In terms of philosophy and what to do with that cash, it really hasn't changed. I mean our primary goal is to find acquisitions that are attractive to the business to kind of our strategic growth plan and have that as the primary use of excess cash and aside from obviously our quarterly dividends.

And to the extent we are not able to do that, then we will look to repurchase shares in excess of what we issue to bankers as part of their compensation. And as you know, we've had a strategy in place to minimize dilution associated with compensation equity. And we've -- essentially, since we went public, been able to do that, we intend to continue to do that.

We've used acquisitions as the primary source of excess cash, and we'll continue to do so. And to the extent we don't have acquisitions available, then we'll evaluate whether excess repurchases or a onetime dividend would be an attractive way to return cash to shareholders. But we don't expect to hold on to anything in excess for any long periods of time.

Okay. Should we think of you guys as being kind of open to additional acquisitions? Or is there going to -- should there be a pause here while you digest GCA?

I don't think we'll...

Go ahead, Scott.

I will say, we're always looking. And if we find the right opportunities, we'll continue to do acquisitions. Having said that, I think practicality at least from a larger-sized transaction for the foreseeable future until we make more headway in the integration makes those kinds of more sizable acquisitions less likely in the short term. But it's part of the way we like to run the business, the way we like to grow. And so I would anticipate we will do acquisitions in the future.

Okay. One cleanup for you, Lindsey. The tax rate, should we think of kind of last quarter is the kind of forward run rate? Is that a good starting point?

It's not a bad starting point. I'm hoping this is still a combination of companies here, and we're still working through taxes. But I think high 20s, 30% is probably a good way to think about it going forward.

(Operator Instructions) Our next question is from Brennan Hawken with UBS.

So you guys provided some pretty clear messaging around selling growth, although still growing. But given the remarkable strength in the current quarter, I'm a little unclear about what the baseline is that we're supposed to consider that growth off of?

Are you talking about continuing to grow off of the pace of the recent quarter? Are you talking about continuing to grow off the year-to-date results this year? I mean year-to-date, you've already reported more revenue than you did in the full fiscal year of 2021. So how are you supposed to calibrate and base -- use the baseline to think about growth from here?

Go ahead, Lindsey.

Sure. Look, I think the year-to-date number, if you got any message from today's call is much better than the quarterly number. So I'd say that we did have an extraordinary quarter.

I think that we believe that our year-to-date results are reflective of an extremely strong M&A market that has really, I think, risen all boats in our industry. Our reported results are not significantly different than many of our competitors or peers. So I'd say focus on year-to-date. That is a good, stable, I'd say, normalized number to think about in terms of where to go from here.

Having said that, we recognize that we're in arguably the best M&A and capital markets environment that we've ever seen, certainly in my career. So I think we, as Scott suggested in his comments, expect some sort of moderation in this calendar year that should affect the entire industry, and what that looks like, no one knows. But yes, focus on year-to-date, not quarter.

Got it. And yes, I think pretty much most investors are in the same boat as you been expecting some moderation here in this calendar year. So one more calibration question. Lindsey, I believe you indicated a growth rate similar to the last few decades. My model, and it goes back to your fiscal 2005, but still using that and going up until fiscal year 2021, I get an average of about 11%.

So is that kind of low double digit the right range? If I -- this year, to date is such a monster that if I include that the year-to-date in the average, it would bump it up a few more percentage points into the roughly 14% range. So are those the sort of numbers that you are talking about? Am I going back far enough to calibrate for that growth rate?

Are you talking about average fee increases, average fee rate increases specifically?

Yes. Yes. Total fee revenue growth for the firm as a whole.

Yes. I don't know if 10% to 11% is the right number. I'd say that we, over the last couple decades, and it changes every year. We have seen a good strong contribution from what I call fee inflation. It's unique to the middle market. If you're doing $6 billion deal, next year you're not going to do $6.6 billion deal. It doesn't work that way.

But when you're doing smaller transactions and you're moving up markets, you are going to see some inflation that definitely is one of the components of our growth, and we don't expect that to change, whether it's 5% or 15%, I think it will vary. But I do believe that for the foreseeable future, in our Corporate Finance business and in our FVA business, you are going to see some fee inflation because of the size of our restructuring transactions and because of the seasonality of that business, you're not likely to see fee growth in restructuring other than in a period of distress. But yes, you can build that into your model, but I think it's anyone's guess on what number that is and it is going to vary a little bit by year.

Brennan, what I...

Yes. Go ahead, Scott.

Brennan, what I would add is, whether you look over 5, 10, 15 years, we have tended to grow at a very -- I won't say, year-by-year consistent rate, but over a couple of year trends by the numbers that you've quoted. You have a couple of things going on.

One, the largest transaction we've ever done is the GCA transaction, which really only showed up in our financials in this quarter versus previous quarters. So you're going to have a statistical aberration in growth rate quarter-over-quarter because of this new acquisition.

Obviously, as we have a full year's worth of results, it will more stabilize. You also have some seasonality that always occurs in this calendar quarter. all not only us but our peers I think they've all commented, we're all operating in an extremely favorable business environment for the business that we do. And sometimes it's very favorable. Sometimes it's less favorable.

So we clearly, I think, experienced for some of those reasons, some growth rates in our revenues higher than obviously what we're going to expect in the foreseeable future. But we do still expect as the businesses reputation as the businesses brand, as the businesses depth of skills, coverage, et cetera, continues to increase, I still believe that there is quite a bit of growth potential for us. We're just probably in a little bit of an aberrational time period if somebody is trying to focus on the last quarter or 2 and what you do with that?

Right. Okay. Appreciate it. One more follow-up, if I might. GCA, they are focused on technology, some of the questions that I received from investors is whether or not the more hawkish antitrust rhetoric that we're hearing out of regulators might be problematic here. Could you just remind us about the average size, maybe the range of deal size for GCA in that tech practice, what the geographic mix is and how many of the deals are cross-border just because it's sort of my sense that would be a lower risk for their business model based on how I understand it, but I'm curious if you can provide some additional color. And let me know if that's right.

The size of the deals that they do are similar to what we've described as mid-cap. So think of that generally speaking, of deals under $1 billion probably put whatever currency you'd like into that. Clearly, there are some that we've collectively done in the billions. But I think most of the significant antitrust concerns are in the $10 billion, $20 billion, $50 billion, et cetera, type deals, which is not the typical kind of deal that we're getting involved in.

So I think whatever increase in antitrust issues will impact us nominally, at least historically, that's been our experience. And don't have a statistic for you off the top of my head on what is the cross-border work that we're doing in the organization. We clearly do work, I'll call it, within the country and across countries and across oceans.

So I think we're all aware and we read what we do about antitrust issues. I think it's going to be far less of an issue for the typical size deals we're doing, including GCA, including the technology space compared to what might be occurring with some of our competitors who focus on much larger deals.

We have reached the end of the question-and-answer session, and I will now turn the call over to Scott Beiser for closing remarks.

I want to thank you all for participating in our third quarter fiscal year 2022 earnings call. We look forward to updating everyone on our progress when we discuss our fourth quarter and full year results for fiscal 2022 this coming spring.

This concludes today's conference, and you may disconnect your lines at this time. Thank you for your participation.